Day 124 Wednesday 9.v.2018
Curtis Banks being complete wankers and still no money despite Kirsty bugging them. I wonder if they're having real problems. Or Aviva is. (Like losing all my money)
Suzanne came up to me yesterday, looking concerned, and asked if I was OK, and did I want to talk about it. Which was kind. I said I was fine, which I am, and thanked her. I more or less kept quiet most of the day, which was fairly easy with all the French about being busy. And Harriet left me a long message - she rang about 9pm but my phone was still on silent after meditation so I didn't hear it, which was a pity. I had a nightcap which I took up to my caravan with me when I went to bed. I'd told myself to leave it until tomorrow, and then a few minutes later just turned around and poured it out, ignoring the quiet voice - which I haven't noticed for a while, as if it hasn't needed to say anything, or the whole world has been a quiet voice, encouraging me, for months. Don't do it again, or any more. I was thinking this morning, making my tea, how I like feeling good about myself, and confident of what I'm doing and my judgements. And I haven't been as much here, lately; the challenges of community, and strangers, faint breezes of negativity. Not the madness of Rebecca (although that is probably, in part, her response to exactly the same thing - feeling challenged or questioned by others) or the directness of Jacques. He was unhappy with me, AND SAID SO DIRECTLY, and then in the morning checked I was OK, and he was right, and I knew it at the time, even if I felt hurt that he'd said it, in front of everyone else (that I talked too much and too loud and smoked too much).
Just the underlying vibes, especially from Andrew, and to some extent (I hardly saw him / had any interaction with him after I'd picked him up) from Giovanni. And puzzled as to what exactly it is that upsets them. The random Russians who turned up on Sunday, uninvited (we do have a sign saying Proprieté Privée, Andrew says, up by the gatehouse) - I radiated hostility and unwelcomeness at them - not very Christian - there was something wrong about them, as if they felt they had a right to be wandering around, and he looked very mafiosi - a bruiser. No 'is it ok? may we look around?' - just this is an Abbaye and we came to have a look. Enough to make you want to install a steel security gate and a video camera at the entrance. The point being, I was feeling towards them what I get the feeling of from Andrew, and Giovanni, and Laurence. A sort of 'keep out, mind your own business, who are you, what are you doing here?' - as if I'm giving off the Russians' vibe - arrogance, don't care what you think, I'm entitled, I'm as good as you are.
Actually Andrew was great yesterday. Relaxed, wandering around in his Hawkwind tee shirt (he's a real fan, we had a long chat about them and Lemmy when I was here in January) took himself off to watch Gerard and Brigitte breadmaking, postponed from last time because Gerard was too drunk / hungover to do it, and I felt sorry for Brigitte who's a sweetie, and rather pathetic, in the proper old fashioned sense (filled with pathos, the opposite of apatheia). And he came up and said how nice the bathroom looked. He commented on the shoe box - we don't need wellies going straight on to the nice green moquette - and my cat ban, and said the bathroom wasn't mine, y'know. Smiling, but they are a bit weird about cats' rights. I just said something about boundaries and he took it in good part. Is it just me being biffy and laying down the law he doesn't like, encroaching on his territory? But it's our territory. Like him being really quite silly about Rebecca wanting the house empty / quiet before 9am, and Andrew insisting on his morning meeting with Jean Christophe in the kitchen - no, it's a communal space, not a private meeting room, but he was getting on his high horse about his authority and Rebecca questioning it (in front of everyone). But he was aware of it, and laughing at himself too. I think it was good when I turned up, he was feeling a bit besieged. Men and women. Young and old. Constant turnover arrivals and departures. No stability (the farm and stores being upended in September), constant undermining from all sides - Rouel, various bods in London, Paris, Washington. It's shit here! Thank god for my caravan, for Delyth and the Edspace. No wonder I'm thinking seriously about being alone on a mountain on Naxos. And the propagation of rumours - the bones in the altar rail, the destruction of the bridge, things happening / not happening at this time or that, personnel changes - what happened to Martin in Berlin?
No wonder Delyth keeps separate, almost in purdah (gluten intolerance is good for something)
Shock - his offhand remark about it not mattering about Minny and her pregnancy. Is even he getting a bit fed up with Delyth's cat obsessions? I do wind them up about it, but I did seriously think about taking Minny off to the woods and doing her in. I assumed, because she is pregnant, again! (Suzanne and I both agree), that she couldn't go to the vets to be sterilised, but Andrew said something very-unAndrew like about 'that doesn't matter' only it sounded much worse than that. i.e. that she'd not only be sterilised but aborted too.
Must go to the loo, and meditate (I didn't set my alarm, and didn't wake up until nearly 7).
Arnaud and Pascale had at least 3 showers yesterday (and they're supposed to be living the simple life down in the hunting lodge). Just shows, it only encourages them. A washing up bowl and some hot water would be much better, on a concrete floor.
This isn't running away, a retreat. It's a mine field, and an assault course. It's like being married to 6 strangers, and you can't even have sex with them. (although that gets to be a problem in some communities). We couldn't survive without meditation, and rules. I remember Placid saying how living in a community wasn't easy, and me getting married to Pol was the easier option. Or my thinking it at any rate.
If I break the rules, treats aren't treats any more (they're only treats, if they're deserved). And magical thinking - things must be fine because I'm sober, or at least, as fine as they could be - stops working too.
It's a lovely grey, damp, drizzly, proper day. The PV panel's not very happy, but it doesn't matter because I'm not trying to run the fridge off it anymore. Extract it from the 'van and test it, and fix it or replace it. Get on with installing the woodburner. I'm a bit reluctant to start destroying my cosy little heaven (but the bathroom and the door are a bit of a pain - be good to clear all the clutter out. And make myself a sensible bed.) I keep waking up with a very painful left shoulder, which Ingrid's nurofen gel takes cares of, but I suspect a decent mattress would help. Must stabilise the caravan - its boat impressions are starting to make me sea sick.
. . . that if I let the drinking creep back, I shall lose all that I have so wonderfully (I was going to say painfully, but it wasn't and isn't - life IS painful, sometimes, but not drinking doesn't make it so) been given, and gained these past 7 months. It has been so intense, so lived, so good, and I don't think there can be any compromise, even if I thought I could get away with it. Maybe now is the real test and not just because I'm going to Naxos. Suzanne said yesterday she thought I had already left, which perhaps I have, in my head.
No med. Didn't finish my porridge. I did have a shower, which felt / feels lovely. Jacques striding back down the hill, out of the woods, back from his morning constitutional.
all this stuff about other people being pissed off with me. So they find me annoying, at times. And I find them annoying. Not drinking does help me see that sort of thing more clearly - it's not a one way street, it's not all about me. They glare. I make scathing and sarcastic remarks and pretend I'm joking (John being upset when I ticked him off about not answering the phone by making some sarcastic remark about there not being a rule against answering the phone). I wonder if that's why he left in a rush - the 'community' getting to him. I wonder how he'll get on in the monastery. He thinks it's what he wants, that he's been looking for all his life, but he's 41 and he still hasn't got stuck in to it. Another set of very bright intense eyes. There are a lot of them about. Suzanne said at dinner in Vivonne it was the first thing she looked for in a man. Not their bum, apparently. And their voice.
Alarm's gone off. Time for morning meeting.
H's email subject '???' - just like a speech bubble in Tintin. Am I Capt Haddock? Is Belle Snowy? Is Harriet Il Signora Castiglione? And Belle's message for the day - perfect!
Doing the accounts. Andrew needs a secretary - no snopake, or obvious filing system. He also needs a filing cabinet. And the staple gun empty, and very separated from the packet of staples.
Interactions between Bertie (dad), Minnie (mum) and one of the kittens. Kitten v submissive to Bertie, but also jealous - he and Minnie sniffing noses. Don't really want to drag her off to the woods, and the kittens are (yeah okay) adorable. (being sick, off screen, sound of). Garlic fills the hall and stairs - Jacques and Katherine making delicious lunch. Must go do the chapelle, Andrew in a meeting and about to sign something related to goats (hay for and pasturing thereof).
The shower was lovely, and the shower curtain is a great improvement. Was black a good choice? I shared about the contrast, for me of Naxos and being alone, autonomous, in control, answerable only to myself, and being here in community. Then Jacques read his commentary on the rule by a French monk, at lunchtime med, about living in community being all about 'combat' - with oneself and others, not just the search for God and eternal verities, and tranquillity, if at all. A bit Zen. Sweep the floor. The usual funny synchronicities of this place and, being sober, noticing them, everywhere, all the time.
I don't want to 'fail' in Naxos, so I'm sort of pre-failing here, setting myself up to 'fail' there. But I really don't want to. 'Fail' again, 'fail' better, as the wise French Irishman said (Becket, not Gormally).
Katherine made coconut milk based soup for lunch, which was surprisingly white and delicious. Jacques offered to help me do dinner, my heart sank slightly, I don't do joint cooking, but it was great and we worked really well together, and everything was good, apart from the rice which I just boiled as a backup in case there wasn't enough, but there was plenty. I went off at 5.30 to get dressed for Ascension Eve mass and got bit carried away. Bright scarlet trousers, polished brown shoes, my new mustard gold jacket and my party tie, which seemed to go with everything, including the green trousers I wasn't wearing. Arnaud said I looked very chic, and Andrew liked my tie. It's funny how all these bright clothes seem to be working (like my Soweto shirt the other night). Funny too how French all the French are, how Swiss Suzanne, Colombian Elba, Brazilian the Brazilian couple, and I suppose how English we are (Andrew, Katherine and me, reluctant as I am to admit it), and Welsh Delyth is. Clemence is very French, as is Thomas. She looked very sulky this morning after meditation. Perhaps Thomas twisted her arm. Then later she smiled and looked very happy. Some people aren't very cheerful in the mornings, I've noticed. Possibly even less so when I'm bouncing around.
Arnaud has spotted salamanders in the well, wild bees in old hives in the wood (bois, not foret, Pascale was very particular), orchids below the lake - I'd looked the other day, expecting some, but not finding any - woodpecker hanging upside down from an oak branch (he has a frighteningly expensive looking camera and a very professional looking telescope, and binocs - the opposite of visually impaired, but he seems to have difficulty speaking, even in French. Pascale compensates adequately.) And La Dame Blanche in the Ecuries - one of their words for a barn owl. He said it was effruyée, which is why it didn't move when he and Andrew spotted it. And lots of deer. Goats I think are Chevreuil, who make Chevre. And 'partager' is to share. Gormally is very impressed by Babbel, which is reassuring. A shame they don't do Greek. It might be fun to try German, or Spanish, or Italian - I've paid for a second language I think.
Day 125 Thursday 10.v.2018
Woke at 10 to 6. Saying goodbye to Jacques and Suzanne this morning. I'm taking them to the Gare at 9.30. S is off to Lyons to see friends and then to garden for a woman somewhere down south. She told me where and I've forgotten, she laughed and said that only the garden was important. We didn't talk last night after supper (I went off to help Katherine clear up and when we'd finished, she'd gone to bed) and she didn't massage my shoulder, which would have been nice, although it seems to be much better this morning. Jacques goes back to Quimper, seven hours by train via Tours and Nantes. I think he said he'd be back in August. He has to work for 2 more years - he looks after special needs children and teaches yoga - and then he plans to move back here permanently.
Patrick Gormally is very keen to come here regularly (every Wednesday) and teach us French. He approves of Babbel. I didn't manage a lesson yesterday, but gabbled away to Jacques after mass at Marçay, suddenly feeling very articulate. Being able to follow and say the liturgy in French (they had actual books of words, music and hymns, yet they never have mass, and couldn't unlock the tabernacle to get the hosts out - the priest made a joke about how at least he knew the hosts were safe in Marçay) was nice, and seemed to get me in to gear. Gormally has lived and taught here for 40 years, and says he is French, and before that Irish. He got very indignant with Pascale (she said) when she called him Anglo-Saxon, although as I pointed out at supper, practically everyone in the British Isles has the same genes. Is that an Italian tomato story?
Is today 125, or 122 (just rub out the last 3 days - 2 kirsch nightcaps, a pastis and a glass of wine) or Day 1? I feel fine, but washing up last night was a warning - emptying the dregs of a couple of glasses of wine, not down the sink, as I was clearing up. I took myself off to bed smartish, and no thought to go back for more later, but I can remember the twitching, and watching Andrew like a hawk as he poured me a pastis. I don't think 'normal' drinking is going to happen, or even the 'occasional' glass. At least last night was in public. And my resolve in mass, and earlier, not to drink at all, which dissolved when we got back and everyone was standing around with aperitifs outside the edspace, and me in my party clothes and all.
The priest invited Pascale to say something about Bonnevaux, and introduced us all to the congregation. Pascale gave a very polished little speech, not too long, and good that it was her, a Frenchwoman, and not Andrew. She's said she's quite practised at it, she does it a lot.
Today I must do my laundry and check in for Aegean to Athens and Mykonos. Surprised Michaili didn't know the ferry times from Mykonos (he said he will meet me off the ferry) - makes me a bit worried they were wrong on the internet - I didn't actually book the tickets (€38 each way! more than Blue Star from Athens, and only one ferry a day from Mykonos, although there are more by the time I go back). Get another gas bottle for the caravan and hook it up - leave the fridge running on gas while I'm away, and I don't know how much of the first 11kg bottle I've used. And make the caravan shipshape, and pack my little bag.
I finished The Shadow of the Wind before going to sleep, very good, and satisfying. I do like happy endings. I'm glad H seemed to like my ending for Metanoia, I wonder if anyone else will. He has written 5 novels according to the blurb, I wonder what the others are like? This was his first. A sort of thriller and a detective story, and about 5 love stories, all sad, a melodrama, very good about Spain and Barcelona during and after the Civil War. Tank Action now, which Johnny enjoyed, by way of contrast, and re-start Cats on Naxos, which I have done. It may just end up being a novella. Then something else, after I've got Stuart's book and Metanoia off the presses.
Must have a crap. It's nearly 7 and time for morning med. It was very nice starting the day with a shower yesterday.
I went to mass in my finery with turmeric stained hands, which matched (or clashed with) my jacket and tie.
Still haven't spoken to H. She's noticed my confession, and wants to know more. Did I drink, because she had? Not that she made me, or it's in any way her fault, but it was funny how alone it made me feel, I like doing it together with her. And the temptation (or thought) to carry on through Naxos . . . as if I'm just afraid I won't be able to do it, was afraid (stay sober there), and yet I really want to, especially if it was what I've been saying it is, the big divide, the decision between solitude there and community here (and maybe drinking there and not here - but I don't think so. Neither works if I drink).
The bell's just rung. Time to go.
A full house, literally. Andrew, Arnaud & Pascale, Katherine, Suzanne, Jacques, Elba, Thomas & Clemence, only Delyth not with us. She and Suzanne and Andrew sang their piece from the Upanishads at supper, which sounded wonderful in the kitchen. I don't think Suzanne cried, she said she would if Andrew was nice to her. Pascale had brought us lovely tarts for her last supper. I could swear I've heard the music, or the words, or both before, but Delyth says its her composition and she only did it for some national conference two or three years ago. It sounds like something by Margaret Rizza, but perhaps all meditators do the same thing with voices.
I never did find out why Suzanne is so anti-Catholic. I meant to ask her, might have done last night if we had talked. Although I don't think she really wanted to talk about it. Any more than I wanted to talk to her about my 'lapse'. Although she offered.
The smoke alarm's just gone off, a bit randomly. Smoking with all the windows shut, but not for the first time, and the ventilator in the roof is open. Time to get dressed and say goodbye to A & P and take S & J to the station.
It didn't feel wrong, but it didn't feel safe. And I didn't really enjoy it (as in, I'd have been just as happy without it - happier, because I would have been 100% sober, not that I was remotely pissed, but it did make me wonder what all the fuss was about. I positively like my NA beer, but the wine and pastis and kirsch are nothing special. Whisky might be different, although the swig I took at Felicity's was a bit of a shock - it tasted like my very first whisky, i.e. horrible!). As if one is not really tasting anything, just sampling memories and associations, and looking for the warm fuzzy. And I suspect that all I really want is the burn, that heat in the gut - that was what I liked about the kirsch.
My caravan Friday 11.v.2018 9:53
A beam of light, tendrils of smoke;
motes descending, turned into stars by the sun,
then winking out,
dust to dust.
The bees busy, climbing up the beam
out in to the sun filled day;
foraging
and returning
to their little home above my bed.
The caravan, swept, tidied,
bits put away,
awaiting guests, perhaps,
or my return.
Started crying when I boarded the Aegean flight in Paris. A lovely hostessy Greek air hostess said yassu to me - fortunately I was first on the plane and heading for my seat right at the back so I was able to hide until I recovered myself. Probably just the stress of getting from the bus station at Bercy to Roissy Charles de Gaulle, via a hot and wiggly walk to Gare de Lyon and a complete lack of signage as to where the airport navette picked up passengers. And it was €31 for the return bus trip to CDG. So far the ferry from Mykonos and the bus from Gare de Lyon have cost almost as much as the 4 hour bus ride from Poitiers and the flight from Paris to Mykonos. And then there's the snacks along the way. Even Poitiers Gare charged me €10 for a cup of coffee and a wet roll.
Lovely email from Suzanne. Can't reply as I'm somewhere over the Alps. So far so sober. The airport Brioche de Paris had Buckler NA beer, which was nice.
email to Belle, Athens, Saturday 12 May, 1:40am, in answer to her question about why I was worried about coming to Naxos.
"only that the last time I was here, I was still drinking. In fact I thought I might die on my last day - I just skulked in a darkened Athens hotel bedroom waiting for my flight back to England. And I signed up for the 7/30/100 days a week later. Naxos and alcohol are very much entwined for me (or in my head at any rate). I'm looking forward to a week here, sober, seeing my friends, none of whom are drunks, although three own bars, but feeling trepidacious too. And things were starting to get a bit unhinged at Bonnevaux for me, before I left. A nice Swiss girl, who reads my blog and knows my history, said she felt I had already left, which was sort of true. Actually, just living in a small, very intense, very young community is very hard work, quite a lot of ego bashing going on (not deliberate or malicious, just goes with the territory). The regular meditation is a great help. On the other hand the population changes almost every day, so one's constantly getting to know new people, and they you, and then saying goodbye. Not exactly overwhelm, but something like. I'm hoping Naxos will be a nice rest. And it will be good to see old friends again."
"You are a satnav
I have this quiet little voice in my head, that says things like 'not a good idea', or 'why don't you do this?' - not necessarily about drinking, or even the apparently big and important things in life. It never shouts, never gets angry, or judgemental, or hurt and upset. If I ignore it, it just stops. It does not nag.
We have this communal car here, a Citroen Picasso, which has a nice French lady satnav. She's a bit dumb - not her fault, but her map's out of date, so she doesn't know about the Poitiers - Bordeaux TGV that's appeared about a mile west of us, or the upgraded N10 to the east of us, and keeps trying to get us to take the next gauche or droite into a brick wall, or a very obvious impasse, when she's trying to take us home. But if you ignore her, or don't do what she says, she doesn't get angry or upset or shouty, she just recalcules la route and gives you another suggestion. Eventually we get there. I know you say fuck a lot, but it's not generally directed at us, as individuals - you just keep pointing out the obvious - if you break your foot, you need to use crutches for a while - and sometimes, the not so obvious, like what you need is more treats (I suffer from a terrible lack of imagination in that regard - I haven't really come up with anything better than a choc ice yet, although my jacket was a definite and very cheap treat - see pic
€5 from Emmaus Friperie) or just keep emailing, which is what I am doing now.
So, thanks, sober satnav."
Curtis Banks being complete wankers and still no money despite Kirsty bugging them. I wonder if they're having real problems. Or Aviva is. (Like losing all my money)
Suzanne came up to me yesterday, looking concerned, and asked if I was OK, and did I want to talk about it. Which was kind. I said I was fine, which I am, and thanked her. I more or less kept quiet most of the day, which was fairly easy with all the French about being busy. And Harriet left me a long message - she rang about 9pm but my phone was still on silent after meditation so I didn't hear it, which was a pity. I had a nightcap which I took up to my caravan with me when I went to bed. I'd told myself to leave it until tomorrow, and then a few minutes later just turned around and poured it out, ignoring the quiet voice - which I haven't noticed for a while, as if it hasn't needed to say anything, or the whole world has been a quiet voice, encouraging me, for months. Don't do it again, or any more. I was thinking this morning, making my tea, how I like feeling good about myself, and confident of what I'm doing and my judgements. And I haven't been as much here, lately; the challenges of community, and strangers, faint breezes of negativity. Not the madness of Rebecca (although that is probably, in part, her response to exactly the same thing - feeling challenged or questioned by others) or the directness of Jacques. He was unhappy with me, AND SAID SO DIRECTLY, and then in the morning checked I was OK, and he was right, and I knew it at the time, even if I felt hurt that he'd said it, in front of everyone else (that I talked too much and too loud and smoked too much).
Just the underlying vibes, especially from Andrew, and to some extent (I hardly saw him / had any interaction with him after I'd picked him up) from Giovanni. And puzzled as to what exactly it is that upsets them. The random Russians who turned up on Sunday, uninvited (we do have a sign saying Proprieté Privée, Andrew says, up by the gatehouse) - I radiated hostility and unwelcomeness at them - not very Christian - there was something wrong about them, as if they felt they had a right to be wandering around, and he looked very mafiosi - a bruiser. No 'is it ok? may we look around?' - just this is an Abbaye and we came to have a look. Enough to make you want to install a steel security gate and a video camera at the entrance. The point being, I was feeling towards them what I get the feeling of from Andrew, and Giovanni, and Laurence. A sort of 'keep out, mind your own business, who are you, what are you doing here?' - as if I'm giving off the Russians' vibe - arrogance, don't care what you think, I'm entitled, I'm as good as you are.
Actually Andrew was great yesterday. Relaxed, wandering around in his Hawkwind tee shirt (he's a real fan, we had a long chat about them and Lemmy when I was here in January) took himself off to watch Gerard and Brigitte breadmaking, postponed from last time because Gerard was too drunk / hungover to do it, and I felt sorry for Brigitte who's a sweetie, and rather pathetic, in the proper old fashioned sense (filled with pathos, the opposite of apatheia). And he came up and said how nice the bathroom looked. He commented on the shoe box - we don't need wellies going straight on to the nice green moquette - and my cat ban, and said the bathroom wasn't mine, y'know. Smiling, but they are a bit weird about cats' rights. I just said something about boundaries and he took it in good part. Is it just me being biffy and laying down the law he doesn't like, encroaching on his territory? But it's our territory. Like him being really quite silly about Rebecca wanting the house empty / quiet before 9am, and Andrew insisting on his morning meeting with Jean Christophe in the kitchen - no, it's a communal space, not a private meeting room, but he was getting on his high horse about his authority and Rebecca questioning it (in front of everyone). But he was aware of it, and laughing at himself too. I think it was good when I turned up, he was feeling a bit besieged. Men and women. Young and old. Constant turnover arrivals and departures. No stability (the farm and stores being upended in September), constant undermining from all sides - Rouel, various bods in London, Paris, Washington. It's shit here! Thank god for my caravan, for Delyth and the Edspace. No wonder I'm thinking seriously about being alone on a mountain on Naxos. And the propagation of rumours - the bones in the altar rail, the destruction of the bridge, things happening / not happening at this time or that, personnel changes - what happened to Martin in Berlin?
No wonder Delyth keeps separate, almost in purdah (gluten intolerance is good for something)
Shock - his offhand remark about it not mattering about Minny and her pregnancy. Is even he getting a bit fed up with Delyth's cat obsessions? I do wind them up about it, but I did seriously think about taking Minny off to the woods and doing her in. I assumed, because she is pregnant, again! (Suzanne and I both agree), that she couldn't go to the vets to be sterilised, but Andrew said something very-unAndrew like about 'that doesn't matter' only it sounded much worse than that. i.e. that she'd not only be sterilised but aborted too.
Must go to the loo, and meditate (I didn't set my alarm, and didn't wake up until nearly 7).
Arnaud and Pascale had at least 3 showers yesterday (and they're supposed to be living the simple life down in the hunting lodge). Just shows, it only encourages them. A washing up bowl and some hot water would be much better, on a concrete floor.
This isn't running away, a retreat. It's a mine field, and an assault course. It's like being married to 6 strangers, and you can't even have sex with them. (although that gets to be a problem in some communities). We couldn't survive without meditation, and rules. I remember Placid saying how living in a community wasn't easy, and me getting married to Pol was the easier option. Or my thinking it at any rate.
If I break the rules, treats aren't treats any more (they're only treats, if they're deserved). And magical thinking - things must be fine because I'm sober, or at least, as fine as they could be - stops working too.
It's a lovely grey, damp, drizzly, proper day. The PV panel's not very happy, but it doesn't matter because I'm not trying to run the fridge off it anymore. Extract it from the 'van and test it, and fix it or replace it. Get on with installing the woodburner. I'm a bit reluctant to start destroying my cosy little heaven (but the bathroom and the door are a bit of a pain - be good to clear all the clutter out. And make myself a sensible bed.) I keep waking up with a very painful left shoulder, which Ingrid's nurofen gel takes cares of, but I suspect a decent mattress would help. Must stabilise the caravan - its boat impressions are starting to make me sea sick.
. . . that if I let the drinking creep back, I shall lose all that I have so wonderfully (I was going to say painfully, but it wasn't and isn't - life IS painful, sometimes, but not drinking doesn't make it so) been given, and gained these past 7 months. It has been so intense, so lived, so good, and I don't think there can be any compromise, even if I thought I could get away with it. Maybe now is the real test and not just because I'm going to Naxos. Suzanne said yesterday she thought I had already left, which perhaps I have, in my head.
No med. Didn't finish my porridge. I did have a shower, which felt / feels lovely. Jacques striding back down the hill, out of the woods, back from his morning constitutional.
all this stuff about other people being pissed off with me. So they find me annoying, at times. And I find them annoying. Not drinking does help me see that sort of thing more clearly - it's not a one way street, it's not all about me. They glare. I make scathing and sarcastic remarks and pretend I'm joking (John being upset when I ticked him off about not answering the phone by making some sarcastic remark about there not being a rule against answering the phone). I wonder if that's why he left in a rush - the 'community' getting to him. I wonder how he'll get on in the monastery. He thinks it's what he wants, that he's been looking for all his life, but he's 41 and he still hasn't got stuck in to it. Another set of very bright intense eyes. There are a lot of them about. Suzanne said at dinner in Vivonne it was the first thing she looked for in a man. Not their bum, apparently. And their voice.
Alarm's gone off. Time for morning meeting.
H's email subject '???' - just like a speech bubble in Tintin. Am I Capt Haddock? Is Belle Snowy? Is Harriet Il Signora Castiglione? And Belle's message for the day - perfect!
Doing the accounts. Andrew needs a secretary - no snopake, or obvious filing system. He also needs a filing cabinet. And the staple gun empty, and very separated from the packet of staples.
Interactions between Bertie (dad), Minnie (mum) and one of the kittens. Kitten v submissive to Bertie, but also jealous - he and Minnie sniffing noses. Don't really want to drag her off to the woods, and the kittens are (yeah okay) adorable. (being sick, off screen, sound of). Garlic fills the hall and stairs - Jacques and Katherine making delicious lunch. Must go do the chapelle, Andrew in a meeting and about to sign something related to goats (hay for and pasturing thereof).
The shower was lovely, and the shower curtain is a great improvement. Was black a good choice? I shared about the contrast, for me of Naxos and being alone, autonomous, in control, answerable only to myself, and being here in community. Then Jacques read his commentary on the rule by a French monk, at lunchtime med, about living in community being all about 'combat' - with oneself and others, not just the search for God and eternal verities, and tranquillity, if at all. A bit Zen. Sweep the floor. The usual funny synchronicities of this place and, being sober, noticing them, everywhere, all the time.
I don't want to 'fail' in Naxos, so I'm sort of pre-failing here, setting myself up to 'fail' there. But I really don't want to. 'Fail' again, 'fail' better, as the wise French Irishman said (Becket, not Gormally).
Katherine made coconut milk based soup for lunch, which was surprisingly white and delicious. Jacques offered to help me do dinner, my heart sank slightly, I don't do joint cooking, but it was great and we worked really well together, and everything was good, apart from the rice which I just boiled as a backup in case there wasn't enough, but there was plenty. I went off at 5.30 to get dressed for Ascension Eve mass and got bit carried away. Bright scarlet trousers, polished brown shoes, my new mustard gold jacket and my party tie, which seemed to go with everything, including the green trousers I wasn't wearing. Arnaud said I looked very chic, and Andrew liked my tie. It's funny how all these bright clothes seem to be working (like my Soweto shirt the other night). Funny too how French all the French are, how Swiss Suzanne, Colombian Elba, Brazilian the Brazilian couple, and I suppose how English we are (Andrew, Katherine and me, reluctant as I am to admit it), and Welsh Delyth is. Clemence is very French, as is Thomas. She looked very sulky this morning after meditation. Perhaps Thomas twisted her arm. Then later she smiled and looked very happy. Some people aren't very cheerful in the mornings, I've noticed. Possibly even less so when I'm bouncing around.
Arnaud has spotted salamanders in the well, wild bees in old hives in the wood (bois, not foret, Pascale was very particular), orchids below the lake - I'd looked the other day, expecting some, but not finding any - woodpecker hanging upside down from an oak branch (he has a frighteningly expensive looking camera and a very professional looking telescope, and binocs - the opposite of visually impaired, but he seems to have difficulty speaking, even in French. Pascale compensates adequately.) And La Dame Blanche in the Ecuries - one of their words for a barn owl. He said it was effruyée, which is why it didn't move when he and Andrew spotted it. And lots of deer. Goats I think are Chevreuil, who make Chevre. And 'partager' is to share. Gormally is very impressed by Babbel, which is reassuring. A shame they don't do Greek. It might be fun to try German, or Spanish, or Italian - I've paid for a second language I think.
Day 125 Thursday 10.v.2018
Woke at 10 to 6. Saying goodbye to Jacques and Suzanne this morning. I'm taking them to the Gare at 9.30. S is off to Lyons to see friends and then to garden for a woman somewhere down south. She told me where and I've forgotten, she laughed and said that only the garden was important. We didn't talk last night after supper (I went off to help Katherine clear up and when we'd finished, she'd gone to bed) and she didn't massage my shoulder, which would have been nice, although it seems to be much better this morning. Jacques goes back to Quimper, seven hours by train via Tours and Nantes. I think he said he'd be back in August. He has to work for 2 more years - he looks after special needs children and teaches yoga - and then he plans to move back here permanently.
Patrick Gormally is very keen to come here regularly (every Wednesday) and teach us French. He approves of Babbel. I didn't manage a lesson yesterday, but gabbled away to Jacques after mass at Marçay, suddenly feeling very articulate. Being able to follow and say the liturgy in French (they had actual books of words, music and hymns, yet they never have mass, and couldn't unlock the tabernacle to get the hosts out - the priest made a joke about how at least he knew the hosts were safe in Marçay) was nice, and seemed to get me in to gear. Gormally has lived and taught here for 40 years, and says he is French, and before that Irish. He got very indignant with Pascale (she said) when she called him Anglo-Saxon, although as I pointed out at supper, practically everyone in the British Isles has the same genes. Is that an Italian tomato story?
Is today 125, or 122 (just rub out the last 3 days - 2 kirsch nightcaps, a pastis and a glass of wine) or Day 1? I feel fine, but washing up last night was a warning - emptying the dregs of a couple of glasses of wine, not down the sink, as I was clearing up. I took myself off to bed smartish, and no thought to go back for more later, but I can remember the twitching, and watching Andrew like a hawk as he poured me a pastis. I don't think 'normal' drinking is going to happen, or even the 'occasional' glass. At least last night was in public. And my resolve in mass, and earlier, not to drink at all, which dissolved when we got back and everyone was standing around with aperitifs outside the edspace, and me in my party clothes and all.
The priest invited Pascale to say something about Bonnevaux, and introduced us all to the congregation. Pascale gave a very polished little speech, not too long, and good that it was her, a Frenchwoman, and not Andrew. She's said she's quite practised at it, she does it a lot.
Today I must do my laundry and check in for Aegean to Athens and Mykonos. Surprised Michaili didn't know the ferry times from Mykonos (he said he will meet me off the ferry) - makes me a bit worried they were wrong on the internet - I didn't actually book the tickets (€38 each way! more than Blue Star from Athens, and only one ferry a day from Mykonos, although there are more by the time I go back). Get another gas bottle for the caravan and hook it up - leave the fridge running on gas while I'm away, and I don't know how much of the first 11kg bottle I've used. And make the caravan shipshape, and pack my little bag.
I finished The Shadow of the Wind before going to sleep, very good, and satisfying. I do like happy endings. I'm glad H seemed to like my ending for Metanoia, I wonder if anyone else will. He has written 5 novels according to the blurb, I wonder what the others are like? This was his first. A sort of thriller and a detective story, and about 5 love stories, all sad, a melodrama, very good about Spain and Barcelona during and after the Civil War. Tank Action now, which Johnny enjoyed, by way of contrast, and re-start Cats on Naxos, which I have done. It may just end up being a novella. Then something else, after I've got Stuart's book and Metanoia off the presses.
Must have a crap. It's nearly 7 and time for morning med. It was very nice starting the day with a shower yesterday.
I went to mass in my finery with turmeric stained hands, which matched (or clashed with) my jacket and tie.
Still haven't spoken to H. She's noticed my confession, and wants to know more. Did I drink, because she had? Not that she made me, or it's in any way her fault, but it was funny how alone it made me feel, I like doing it together with her. And the temptation (or thought) to carry on through Naxos . . . as if I'm just afraid I won't be able to do it, was afraid (stay sober there), and yet I really want to, especially if it was what I've been saying it is, the big divide, the decision between solitude there and community here (and maybe drinking there and not here - but I don't think so. Neither works if I drink).
The bell's just rung. Time to go.
A full house, literally. Andrew, Arnaud & Pascale, Katherine, Suzanne, Jacques, Elba, Thomas & Clemence, only Delyth not with us. She and Suzanne and Andrew sang their piece from the Upanishads at supper, which sounded wonderful in the kitchen. I don't think Suzanne cried, she said she would if Andrew was nice to her. Pascale had brought us lovely tarts for her last supper. I could swear I've heard the music, or the words, or both before, but Delyth says its her composition and she only did it for some national conference two or three years ago. It sounds like something by Margaret Rizza, but perhaps all meditators do the same thing with voices.
I never did find out why Suzanne is so anti-Catholic. I meant to ask her, might have done last night if we had talked. Although I don't think she really wanted to talk about it. Any more than I wanted to talk to her about my 'lapse'. Although she offered.
The smoke alarm's just gone off, a bit randomly. Smoking with all the windows shut, but not for the first time, and the ventilator in the roof is open. Time to get dressed and say goodbye to A & P and take S & J to the station.
It didn't feel wrong, but it didn't feel safe. And I didn't really enjoy it (as in, I'd have been just as happy without it - happier, because I would have been 100% sober, not that I was remotely pissed, but it did make me wonder what all the fuss was about. I positively like my NA beer, but the wine and pastis and kirsch are nothing special. Whisky might be different, although the swig I took at Felicity's was a bit of a shock - it tasted like my very first whisky, i.e. horrible!). As if one is not really tasting anything, just sampling memories and associations, and looking for the warm fuzzy. And I suspect that all I really want is the burn, that heat in the gut - that was what I liked about the kirsch.
My caravan Friday 11.v.2018 9:53
A beam of light, tendrils of smoke;
motes descending, turned into stars by the sun,
then winking out,
dust to dust.
The bees busy, climbing up the beam
out in to the sun filled day;
foraging
and returning
to their little home above my bed.
The caravan, swept, tidied,
bits put away,
awaiting guests, perhaps,
or my return.
Started crying when I boarded the Aegean flight in Paris. A lovely hostessy Greek air hostess said yassu to me - fortunately I was first on the plane and heading for my seat right at the back so I was able to hide until I recovered myself. Probably just the stress of getting from the bus station at Bercy to Roissy Charles de Gaulle, via a hot and wiggly walk to Gare de Lyon and a complete lack of signage as to where the airport navette picked up passengers. And it was €31 for the return bus trip to CDG. So far the ferry from Mykonos and the bus from Gare de Lyon have cost almost as much as the 4 hour bus ride from Poitiers and the flight from Paris to Mykonos. And then there's the snacks along the way. Even Poitiers Gare charged me €10 for a cup of coffee and a wet roll.
Lovely email from Suzanne. Can't reply as I'm somewhere over the Alps. So far so sober. The airport Brioche de Paris had Buckler NA beer, which was nice.
email to Belle, Athens, Saturday 12 May, 1:40am, in answer to her question about why I was worried about coming to Naxos.
"only that the last time I was here, I was still drinking. In fact I thought I might die on my last day - I just skulked in a darkened Athens hotel bedroom waiting for my flight back to England. And I signed up for the 7/30/100 days a week later. Naxos and alcohol are very much entwined for me (or in my head at any rate). I'm looking forward to a week here, sober, seeing my friends, none of whom are drunks, although three own bars, but feeling trepidacious too. And things were starting to get a bit unhinged at Bonnevaux for me, before I left. A nice Swiss girl, who reads my blog and knows my history, said she felt I had already left, which was sort of true. Actually, just living in a small, very intense, very young community is very hard work, quite a lot of ego bashing going on (not deliberate or malicious, just goes with the territory). The regular meditation is a great help. On the other hand the population changes almost every day, so one's constantly getting to know new people, and they you, and then saying goodbye. Not exactly overwhelm, but something like. I'm hoping Naxos will be a nice rest. And it will be good to see old friends again."
"You are a satnav
I have this quiet little voice in my head, that says things like 'not a good idea', or 'why don't you do this?' - not necessarily about drinking, or even the apparently big and important things in life. It never shouts, never gets angry, or judgemental, or hurt and upset. If I ignore it, it just stops. It does not nag.
We have this communal car here, a Citroen Picasso, which has a nice French lady satnav. She's a bit dumb - not her fault, but her map's out of date, so she doesn't know about the Poitiers - Bordeaux TGV that's appeared about a mile west of us, or the upgraded N10 to the east of us, and keeps trying to get us to take the next gauche or droite into a brick wall, or a very obvious impasse, when she's trying to take us home. But if you ignore her, or don't do what she says, she doesn't get angry or upset or shouty, she just recalcules la route and gives you another suggestion. Eventually we get there. I know you say fuck a lot, but it's not generally directed at us, as individuals - you just keep pointing out the obvious - if you break your foot, you need to use crutches for a while - and sometimes, the not so obvious, like what you need is more treats (I suffer from a terrible lack of imagination in that regard - I haven't really come up with anything better than a choc ice yet, although my jacket was a definite and very cheap treat - see pic
 |
| Rather better quality than my usual pics - Thanks Thomas |
So, thanks, sober satnav."
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